By my math, the divorce cost Turner about $40 million a year in ad revenue, a deficit it’s trying to fill with Bleacher Report.

Here’s where I’m getting the numbers: Last week, Time Warner CFO John Martin told investors that the addition of Golf.com and SI.com improved Time Inc.’s advertising revenue by 2 percent last quarter.

That is, without those sites, ad revenues would have slipped 9 percent, from $508 million to $462 million, instead of falling 7 percent, to $472 million. That’s a $10 million gap.

It’s possible that $10 million is a quarterly anomaly. But assuming it’s not, that implies a $40 million annual run rate for those two sites. Now look at the reported $30 million that Bleacher Report is supposed to make this year, and the deal lines up quite nicely.

Just as the atom bomb was the weapon that was supposed to render war obsolete, the Internet seems like capitalism’s ultimate feat of self-destructive genius, an economic doomsday device rendering it impossible for anyone to ever make a profit off anything again. It’s especially hopeless for those whose work is easily digitized and accessed free of charge.

— Author Tim Kreider on not getting paid for one’s work

AllThingsD by Writer

AllThingsD.com is a Web site devoted to news, analysis and opinion on technology, the Internet and media. But it is different from other sites in this space. It is a fusion of different media styles, different topics, different formats and different sources. Read more »